Vascular surgery at Arrowe Park Hospital took patients from Warrington and now looks as if the centre will be transferred to Chester. That's one thing but,.........

Glan Clwyd Hospital(Bodelwyddan) Special Baby Unit, is likely to be transferred to Arrowe Park!

Where is the sense in sending sick babies 50 miles plus, and depending on where the parents come from outside Bodelwyddan, could be 70 miles or more. The country has gone completely mad.

http://www.rhyljournal.co.uk/news/116141/mother-s-fears-over-future-of-services-for-sick-babies.aspx

Who dreams these things up ? Gimme strength !

Too much management and not enough empathy.

Apparently, he's a Canadian who has given the go-ahead!!

Right Moonstar. Empathy is a wonderful thing when people need support.

Well now, if he is Canadian he would not consider anything under 200 miles as a journey.

The original thinking behind this is to concentrate centres of excellence rather than having a larger number of smaller specialist centres with less expertise.

Would you rather travel 40 or 50 miles to a centre who do a larger number of operations and have expertise in complicated cases, or just go to the local hospital where the surgeon maybe just does a couple of cases a year, and if something goes awry during the operation may not have the know-how to redeem the situation.

Very much like the Royal in Liverpool is a centre for pancreatic problems. Without that expertise, my father may well not have been here today.

While the cons are in expect more change to the way the NHS runs. Squeezing from everywhere and a lot of changes to happen to A&E departments too. Its only a matter of time before fatalities happen and again nurses will be blamed. Vote Labour!

I understand what you are saying Markjw, yet Liverpool Royal is only a stones throw from Wirral, but I am pleased your father made a good recovery.

To have a new baby and possibly 1,2 or more children at home, how on earth could any parent of a sick or premature baby cope with having to travel 100 miles or more each day? Not everyone has grandarents to step in and take over at home and not everyone could even afford the travelling costs.Having a sick baby must be one of the most traumatic and stressful times of anyones life and if there is already a 'Specialist Baby Unit'at Glan Clwyd, then it must be 'Specialist' by the very meaning of the word.

Littlemink, I believe that the National Assembly of Wales initiated it, which is formed by Welsh Labour, nothing to do with the Tory's. Plus, consultations have been going on long before 2010, in all of U.K. for these Centres of Excellence.

My two Nieces were both born premature at Glan Clwyd..The second one..Georgia, three and a half months prem and weighing less than 2Lb's. They both fought to survive and without the dedication of staff at the SCBU at Glan Clwyd wouldn't be here now.Georgia is now a happy 3 year old and my other niece started high school last September.
I guess what I want to say that if they were born at Arrowe Park it would of been so difficult for my Brother and his wife to see both their girls as Glan Clwyd is on their door step and this enabled them to spend time with their other kids. What Glan Clwyd did for them is something they will never forget and they are horrified that this unit may be moved as are the families they got to know there. They along with many more people are raising money for the unit in the hope they can save it from closure.

What really bothers me is the travel to see a relative or loved one who has been sent to a hospital miles away. They look forward to visitors but must dread the thought that no-one can visit them due to the time of travel and distance. I've been through this quite a few times and did travel 150miles round trip which took 3 hrs to visit my relative for just over an hour. They were so pleased to see people but understood they would be isolated from their family for most of their stay in hospital. I don't know if this takes it out of them but must make them anxious, especially if they have just had a major operation and needing comfort. We could never manage more than 2 visits per week, and it costs more, but you don't mind. Imagine visiting in Chester in the evening - what time would we be back at night if we used public transport. Taxi's would be too expensive. Cardio should be either Arrow Park or the Royal.

What, you mean like this:

Inquiry reports on Stafford Hospital deaths scandal
Previous investigations have already established in harrowing detail the abuse and neglect that contributed to hundreds of deaths from 2005 to 2008.
This inquiry has looked at why regulators and senior NHS managers failed to pick up what was happening.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-21341766

Please remind me who was in government at this time?

Another similar story came out in July last year:

Patient dying of thirst rang 999: Inquest hears of mother's fury at nurses who neglected son

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...s-mothers-fury-nurses-neglected-son.html

At the time there was outrage and blame on the Tories. Only it happened in 2009.

Well said, Gibbo.

Another one from today:

Rotherham NHS Trust loses money in email scam
Rotherham NHS Trust in South Yorkshire has admitted it lost more than £680,000 in an email fraud.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-21345207

Bad management is not a political issue or reason for blame.

I've had to go over to Aintree from B'head, 5 times up to now and one or two more to go I think. Bit of a drag, yet to find out if the same procedures are still available at Arrowe Park, the website gives next to information on anything that's of any use.

It seems that today, everyone wants to blame everything on the government, whether justified or not; easy target.

It was the government who changed the Appointments Commission to NHS Trust Development Authority
These directions from the Secretary of State confer new functions and powers on the NHS Trust Development Authority (NHS TDA) from 1 October 2012. The directions enable the NHS TDA to take over certain functions currently managed by the Department of Health, strategic health authorities and the Appointments Commission.

The functions are:

appointing board members to NHS trusts, trustees to NHS trusts and foundation trusts, and assisting with board appointments to strategic health authorities and primary care trusts
assessing readiness and supporting NHS trust applications for foundation trust authorisation
advising Secretary of State on the need to place an individual NHS trust into the unsustainable provider regime
overseeing NHS trust planning on providing NHS services from April 2013 onwards
assessing feasibility and advising Secretary of State on mergers and acquisitions of NHS trusts by other NHS trusts or foundation trusts
approving capital investments or significant commercial transactions by NHS trusts.

re add appointment of bean counters and cronies old boys network